You've touched the core of the problem; it's "strong in one aspect, boring in others", instead of "strong here, weak somewhere else". This results in lots of units, whose primary function is determined through their stats; this should almost never be the case, save the most basic units. Stats should be used for balancing, while unit's function should be determined by its skills, equipment and weaponry. Second problem is some units not having a niche big enough to make it useful more often then just in edge cases (like Teutons being ok-ish when Coordinated with Joan, or against Sepsitor-heavy CA). This is part of the problem with the Sepulchre - Holoprojector gives him a different tool than other knights have, but it's not enough to make him play differently enough to justify taking over less expensive knights. Holoprojector shenanigans are useful, but MO isn't really flexible enough to take advantage of that. That's why Ayyar contrasts so much with Sepulchre; he brings a completely different skill set to the table compared to other Bahram units. Asawira and Ayyar serve two completely different functions and play in completely different ways.
60 points for a Specialist who gets his brain smeared across the floor by generic KHDs? As much as I like the Setup the Multi MMR is 3 over a Red Fury. Which is 1 below a Spitfire. Add the Assault Pistol for 3 and the Multi MMR + Assault Pistol Sepulchure costs a whooping 61 points (+/- one because I didn't double check everything). With access to a -6 MOD for CC and Holo2 as one of the only delivery mechanisms for CC I'd really like to beef up his CC. His fluff would qualify for a supreme Duelist with NBW. MA2, NBW and Surprise Attack allows you to hit stuff without MA on CC24 -6MOD with a DAM18 DACCW once. Or alternatively puts CC Specialists on -9 while canceling their MA/Protheion/Berserk vs untouched CC21. That guy would be proper scary to face btb.
That would certainly make it a more interesting profile. Also if possible throwing in specialist operative (a skill that seems to be supremely cheap) to leverage his wip 14.
A extremely good new skill for Teutons introduced in Paradiso N3 would be the smoke equivalent to Albedo. In detail, smoke on the model for the first Game Round. Should be a very strong delivery system for them, but would also have to cost a lot, because its crazy good.
The context is that, in general it was a mistake to give each faction a stat to be their "own" and more specifically while this did not prove to be a significant issue with the rest of the factions, for PanO it was one of the most important stats of the game. This makes PanO units expensive.
Doubling Combis+LSG or Combis+Assault Pistols is not helping too you know ? Same as not giving PanO any "discount" weapons (SMGs, Rifles, ChainRifles) etc. CB made a lot of ways to "cheat point system" and only thing PanO got is Frenzy on Hospitallers/Magisters (which absence would made otherwise MO completely unplayable).
Hell nope! I'm pretty sure they'll just strip our +1BS giving nothing in return. So let's just ask for some another balance trick:)
But hey, it's cool because freeing design space and opening up glorious perspectives for entire faction sometime in the future! In the meantime, let's do some Nomads...
Sounds not very exciting... Besides, what else can be our trademark (tm)? Asian guys got CC, Muslims got WIP, Ariadna - PH, etc..
IKR. It was mostly a reference though. Tbh I doubt that stat average is what comes to my mind first when I hear about Haqq or Ariadna or whatever...
Design space is not a problem, PanO is in a good spot, actually. Execution of that design, on the other hand... it's just that designers need to learn that when asking question "so what unit X specializes in?" the answer shouldn't default to "shooting".
What Sepulchre does not need is things that would make him more expensive. He's okay as a profile, he just suffers from the common in PanO "something else in the same points range is pretty much outright better". He's still fine though. Maybe a Marksman Rifle, a Missile Launcher or some sort of Sniper Rifle would make him stand out more. Not sure if he needs a specialist profile; he's better at being a damage dealer and bait (especially with those HoloEchoes) than a clicker IMO. Although Ayyar does have Specialist Operative and is 20pts cheaper somehow...
I feel this is in part due to a lack of an avid Pano player in house. Many pano releases as of late feel like things they felt they "had to" do. Whereas releases like JSA and tunguska truly look like labors of love
If you go through the books in order you can see that CB has learned a lot about faction and unit design over the years. Sometimes it's hard to take that experience back and retroactively fix already released armies and models.
Honestly i dont feel it should be that hard. It is in essence patching. Should we be changing army builder on a weekly basis ? No ofcourse not. But making minor tweeks to units for increased balance and flavor, shouldnt be considered monumental effort. Specially when it is evident internal balance doesnt exist. The statement in the presentation bothered me. Because the argument was, we see hospitallers be used the most. So we based release schedule on them. So the issue becomes self perpetuating. We use hospitallers the majority of the time because they are arguably the best knights. Not the best at their niche, just the best because all knights except magisters occupy almost the exact same niche . So they resculpt the hospitallers. So new players play with the hospitallers because they look the nicests, and veterans rightly tell them they are better. This results in cb looking at stats and saying. "Well why work on the teuton rules or sculpt wise, nobody even plays them" Where it was clearly a problem of their design. I WANT to include sepulchers and teutons in my lists. I want to have varied and fun lists. Make my opponent wonder what i am bringing to the table. Not knowing i will need a hospitaller to shoot myself out of my deployment zone. Ive tried taking santiagos with magisters. And always im faced with the problem , the paramedic is an incompetent boob at bringing back anybody that went down and the spitfire gets stopped by any cleverly placed sniper.
Every time I look at that comparison it just makes me angry. Even being VERY generous with the points costings the Sepulcher ends up clearly at least 5pts (probably more like 10) overcosted in comparison. Yeah, exactly this. It's becoming clearer and clearer that there's just nobody at CB who really cares about PanOceania the way other factions are loved and have cheerleaders.
What but that doesn't make any business sense and its the opposite of what we've been told in the past. We've been told the MO starter sells too well, we wont see it resculpted. Also from a business perspective it doesnt make sense to incur costs to marginally increase profit (potentially i might add, since most mo players already own their magisters). Than to revamp an area that sees little profit in an effort to significantly increase its profitability . Dont get me wrong i love that new magisters came out. But it would have made more sense for them to resculpt the teuton and sepulcher to give them rules updates. Therefore making sure both new and old players want to grab new sculpts and rules.
